This invention relates to a system and method for the reading of electrophoresis gels containing radiolabeled genetic material.
In the field of genetic engineering, it has been a common procedure to produce a photographic or x-ray film auto-radiographic image of DNA sequencing gels and then to laboriously read off the sequences of bases from visual inspection of the film. Such a visual analysis of an auto-radiogram is extremely time consuming and prone to many errors. Furthermore, the exposure time for an auto-radiogram is usually selected based on approximations and rules of thumb, so that the production of such auto-radiograms itself presents difficulties. Where an intensifier plate is utilized with the film to enhance the image intensity, the sharpness of the image is inherently reduced.
Accordingly, it would be highly advantageous if the step of preparing an auto-radiogram film image could be omitted and if the DNA sequence information could be read directly from the gel itself. It would also be advantageous if the information from the gel could be read directly into a computer image storage system, and if the development of the computer image could be observed and selectively controlled.